The Odd End of the 1959 Christmas Caroling in Poplar
by Freud-Plato-SisterMonicaJoan
Summary: Trixie finds out that Cynthia is thinking about becoming a nun. An alternative version of the Caroling Scene (which was filmed but cut) in Christmas Special 2014. A study on friendship, calling and love.


**The Odd End of Christmas Caroling at Poplar in 1959.**

 _"But if she has a vocation, she should follow it. She will find fulfillment that way."_

These words that Tom had earlier said lingered in Trixie's mind. She was sitting on her bed, bewildered by the idea that Cynthia would like to be a nun. She tried to fathom that piece of information. She hadn't been too sympathetic to Cynthia, she had to confess.

Patsy had tried to talk to her sense, from another point of view than Tom, and she was beginning to calm down a little. Now Patsy had gone to see Cynthia, to ask her to come and talk with them, and – she suspected – to give Trixie a chance to mend her relations with Cynthia.

XXX

The day had been extraordinary. Shelagh, Mrs. Turner now, had been leading their small caroling parade at the Maternity Home. Shelagh had beamed with pride when people complimented Timothy on his violin playing. She was fitting in her new life nicely, Trixie thought. She felt Shelagh's example of courage to seek her heart was a sign for her to seek for her inner being.

The nuns and nurses gathered together in the yard after the last ward had been visited. Shelagh had said that she had missed this caroling tour last year and how it felt like coming home, taking part in it again. Yet she had left home eagerly to "poor Patrick" who was waiting for his supper.

After that, there was some chatter in groups divided more by age than religious calling, as Sister Winifred stayed with the younger nurses and Tom.

Then the Cynthia bomb had begun to unravel.

Looking at Shelagh walking away with Timothy, Trixie commented on how Shelagh looked good and how happy she must be in her new life, like she had found a fulfillment.

"Yes, she does look good," Cynthia agreed, with an odd timbre in her voice. Trixie took a closer look at her. Cynthia had been having discussions with Sister Julienne lately. Was something troubling her? Trixie saw how Sister Winifred took Cynthia's arm in a possessive manner, she thought. She felt a sting of jealousy.

Then Trixie suggested a glass of beer at a pub, followed by a common meal of fish and chips. Everyone seemed to agree with this, except of course Sister Winifred. She considered Trixie and Cynthia, like measuring if she should say something. Yet at that moment Sister Julienne was calling Sister Winifred, and she hastily said goodbye and joined the group of Sister Julienne and the choir nuns.

Trixie turned to Cynthia and whispered: "Do you think Sister Winifred didn't like my comments on Shelagh? Or was it just the beer?"

"No, it is not that, "Cynthia responded in her mild style. "It may just be that she understands commitments in another way. I have discussed Shelagh with her."

At that moment Trixie had accepted that as an answer. With the lead of Tom, they went for a beer in a pub, and after that to buy fish and chips. They strolled towards Nonnatus House eating and joking.

"I rather think we ought to save three pennies-worth for Sister Winifred," Patsy said of the meal.

"We could leave them on her bed for her to find - after compline," Trixie added.

Cynthia looked pensive. "I don't think she'd actually thank us for them. When she went back with the nuns, she looked as happy to be with them as we are to be together."

"Yes, but it's an oddly regulated life for a young woman. Or an old one, for that matter," Patsy said. "Although I have become to see that the line of what is normal and not normal may not be as clear as I earlier thought, I still think the monastery rules are odd. I am not sure they carry the spirit of love. Uniformed clothing or keeping early bedtime or withdrawing from earthly pleasures do not necessarily make a person better. "

Cynthia's tone was rather insistent: "You're talking about the things we can see and easily measure, not what goes on behind closed doors or in Nun's spiritual life. I think Sister Winifred does what she feels called to do."

"I can't argue with that," Tom admitted.

"Yes, Tom, but you lead an ordinary life," Trixie pointed out. "You wear ordinary clothes, apart from your dog collar. You live in an ordinary house and you're free to do ordinary things, like marry, if you want to."

Trixie nearly bit her tongue. She was in no position to talk of marriage, and yet she made this blunder.

"I can't argue with that, either," Tom sighed, with a discreet smile.

"But what if Sister Winifred didn't want just ordinary things? What if she felt called to try to live a different way?" Cynthia was in a mode of preaching, even if gentle as ever.

Trixie gave her a look. "Cynthia, you're getting frightfully exercised by this."

"Well, perhaps that's for a reason."

Trixie felt a sting in her heart. "Oh, good grief. So this is what your long talks with Sister Julienne mean. "

"I'm not sure. I haven't made my final decision. But the one thing I do know is that grief doesn't come into it.

I feel as though I'm on the edge of a truly great happiness."

Trixie was agitated. "But only a week ago you shared my thoughts on Shelagh Turner. You agreed that even if she had to go through a lot of pain and struggle before and after she married, she had been right."

Cynthia's mouth twisted. "Trixie, I said I think Shelagh feels called to do what she does. I never said I would follow her course."

Now Trixie turned to Tom, with a bit of fire in her eyes. "Did you know about this, Tom?"

Tom made an apologetic sound. "No, not really. But I am not the one to argue for or against. It is personal." He came to Trixie and looked at her pleadingly.

Cynthia raised her voice: "Oh please, do not quarrel on my account. Let it go, Trixie." She turned on her heels and vanished inside Nonnatus House.

Tom took Trixie's hand. "You knew that Cynthia visits my Church, too, didn't you?"

"Yes, Tom, but this…what has she said about this….turning her back to the world? To us!"

"She has said very little, and you know she isn't really turning her back at you. As she said, grief does not come into it. Once she asked how I knew I should be a priest and if I feel deprived because of my vocation. I answered as truthfully as I could: that I felt that there was no other alternative, and that I do not feel deprived. Sad, conflicted sometimes, for various reasons, but not deprived. If Cynthia has a vocation, she should follow it. She will find fulfillment that way." He squeezed Trixie's arm.

Trixie was looking from Tom to Patsy, who stood there shuffling her feet.

Trixie sighed. "But I thought I knew Cynthia. We have been best of friends for five years. I remember the time when she first let me take her dancing with me. She said that I had helped her to overcome her fear of that, and later she even told me that it meant a great deal to her…self-worth."

"These experiences do not perhaps cancel each other, Trixie," Patsy commented. "You know what drastic measures Tom took just to dance with you. " They all smiled at the memory. "You may wish to dance and still have a vocation, you can love, fall in love and want to dance with your loved one. They all belong to the….love you need to give. How you….express your love. I am not very spiritual myself, but I can see the love that guides the life of the Nuns here. It has been a new experience to me. And it was Cynthia who helped me see that. It is just the monastery rules I object to, I find them odd or irrelevant." Patsy had suddenly become a bit mournful at the end of this little speech.

"Oh, Patsy, you can be quite eloquent. I see some point in that, but this came so…suddenly."

"I do not think it was sudden for Cynthia," Tom reflected. "You do not now think that Shelagh's leaving the Order was sudden, do you? We do not always see the road others should take, before they take it."

"That is also true, to some degree. In the end, it was not so surprising, the Turners, I mean. They make such a sweet and suitable couple. But their case is a bit different. Shelagh was really…needed." Trixie exhaled deep. "But Cynthia and God…why does she want to leave now when we, her friends, have been a part of her life so long?"

"She is not really leaving in that sense," Patsy mused. "Being a novice, for that she must leave for a period, but as a nun she could work here."

"And you, Trixie, if you should leave…for one reason or another…" Tom was slightly blushing, but as Trixie had introduced the topic of marriage today, he boldly continued: "Surely you would not see it as betraying your friends. Love does not expire, even when people take new…challenges."

Trixie smiled. "Perhaps not."

Patsy started to fret. "Come now, we can't leave Cynthia like this. We have to tell her she does not need to be anguished because of discord among her friends. "

"Well, I am not ready to support her full-heartedly yet. I think she should talk with us, too, not just with Sister Julienne, be the result what may."

Trixie's words were stringent, but her style was milder, Tom noticed, relieved. "Well. You girls do that. But remember that love sometimes knows no reasons." With these endearing words he kissed Trixie goodbye and left.

XXX

Trixie admitted to herself that she was maybe a bit biased: after becoming tangled with Tom, she had become sensitive to religious issues. They touched her more than she dared to think. It was not the first time she had thought of the nature of calling. After Shelagh's odd turn of fate, the girls had more than once talked of different callings, and how you find your place in the world. In many moments, even in tender ones, she had felt that Tom was secretly considering her, in a manner both personal and spiritual. Trixie could not have been happier when Tom had seen that she was a deep girl, underneath all that glimmer and chit-chat. She had been waiting to be….found. Found exactly like that.

Shelagh's leaving the order and finding happiness had strengthened Trixie's need to find herself. Tom had seemed to be a fellow mate in this journey, a helper and a support. Now, with Cynthia, there was a foreshadowing which, in contrast to Shelagh's example, she didn't altogether embrace.

XXX

"Here she is." Patsy entered the room with Cynthia after her. Trixie rose and came to hug Cynthia.

"I am sorry I was so cross, Cynthia."

Cynthia stroked Trixie's back. "You are forgiven. I feel better now. I had been a bit afraid of talking about all this with you."

"Well, it seems you had a good reason to be afraid, the idiot I was," Trixie responded in her impeccable style. After the giggling died down, she added: "I sometimes feel a little…lonely, when people talk of religious issues." Her wistful manner affected Cynthia greatly.

"Trixie, you should not disparage yourself because of that. Sometimes there are no words for what one…desires. But our friendship is important to me, even if we are so different. I find it odd that you should feel lonely with me, when you have been a gift from God to me, a friend who never leaves me feeling lonely."

"It is very nice of you to say that. I am not sure that I deserve such praise," Trixie said, relieved.

Cynthia sat down on Patsy's bed and continued: "If, and at this stage only if, if I give the First Promises, will you both be there? If it comes to that. I'd like to think that I do not desert my old friends in my….new life."

"Of course, we will be there. If it happens. Will it take place at Chichester?"

"God willing, it can take place here at Nonnatus Chapel. The earliest date we have discussed with Sister Julienne is the New Year's Eve."

"The New Year's Eve? This year? In four weeks." Trixie was again turning sad, but Patsy took her hand and looked at her steadily, pleading silently.

"Of course we will be there, Cynthia," Patsy said. "Or at any other date. If. If and at this stage only If."

Cynthia laughed a little: "The stages of this journey are not known to me, nor the dates. But I am not bothered by that. I have learnt to be strangely trusting. It is strange to be….called to do something like this. I have always considered myself pretty insignificant. "

Trixie pulled her in her arms again. "Oh no, never insignificant."


End file.
